January 01, 2010

How I Spent 2009 (or, Why I Had to Take a Year Off)

I started The Baseball Card Blog, funny enough, to blog about baseball cards. Collecting baseball cards, trading baseball cards, buying baseball cards. Dealing—tongue firmly in cheek—with the addiction of baseball cards. Openly questioning the sanity of my own fawning over sports stars and their small cardboard representations.

But The Baseball Card Blog became other things as well, though I tried very hard to keep it on topic. This was not to be about my life, unless my life somehow had something to do with baseball cards. This was not to be a forum for ragging on private individuals; I made a point of keeping angry thoughts private.

I poured a lot of time into this blog. I spent a lot of energy writing the stuff I wanted to write: dissertations I felt were needed on sparsely represented topics (hello, 1987 Topps); artistic interpretations to epic odes of futility (Casey at the Bat); giving away cards I liked (The Great Goudey Trade-away); highlighting funny things about utilitymen, bit players, managers, and bona fide stars. I enjoyed this kind of thing.

And then I didn't. I explored selling the blog. I explored bringing in new writers. Ultimately, none of these were ideas I saw to completion. The Baseball Card Blog was retired. I added a link to the Wikipedia page for Casey at the Bat and nobody took it down. I stopped writing.

But I didn't stop collecting. Or reading others' blogs. I kept up with Cardboard Junkie (still my favorite). I started collecting the T118 (World's Greatest Explorers) and T218 (Mecca/Hassan Athletic Champions) sets. I am just about 50% complete on the 1962 Post Cereal set. I started collecting 1956 Topps, 1967 Who Am I?, and lots of miscuts, printing errors and blank fronts and backs. I even got in touch with The Baseball Reliquary in Monrovia, California, about donating a hard copy of the baseball-card Casey at the Bat, but still haven't got my act together to send it along to them.

And all of these things slowly made me want to start writing about it all again. Not religiously blogging three or four times a day so that it gets in the way of me living the rest of my life. But simply writing about baseball cards when I have the time.

I had to take a year off. Now it's time to dust off the cobwebs, tinker with the setup, and see how long it will take me to put together a set by simply buying packs.

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About the Authors

For 20 years, every little scrap of money Ben Henry had went towards feeding his baseball card habit. He started this site instead of beginning what would amount to decades of therapy. He lives outside Boston, Massachusetts.

Mike Kenny lives in Arizona and is a columnist for The Glendale Star & Peoria Times newspapers. Check out his other blog and feel free to tell him what you think.

Travis Peterson has an undying love for the San Diego Padres. He likes to draw baseball cards using MS Paint.